Saturday, June 09, 2007

I missed "Anak Bulan" the last time it was shown at KLPAC but determined to catch it at Kampong Jawa, Klang, on June 13 2007. Although I spent my formative years in Kampong Melayu Kaki Bukit, Singapura 14, I considered myself a city slicker for being born in a cosmopolitan city and subsequently moved to Kuala Lumpur and Petaling Jaya. Now that I'm older and wiser, I learned to appreciate the simplicity of rural life and wished I still had a kampong to return to for the holidays or for a retirement settlement.

“Anak Bulan Di Kampong Wa' Hassan” tells the story of Kampong Wa’ Hassan, the last Malay kampung (village) to fall victim to Singapore's efforts at modernisation. Far from a nostalgia trip down memory lane to a romanticised Malay kampung, this is a journey of discovery of the true worth of a kampung, filled with real-life characters in all their rawness, and the true loss in the dispossession of it.“If 'to know me is to love me', then the way for us to understand why Orang Kampung love the kampung is to get to know the kampung that they know.”

For so long, I felt so smug about signing online petitions to stop global warming and forwarding them to family and friends. Hey, I even watched Al Gore's The Inconvenient Truth. However, I restrained myself from stopping and getting off my car to 'hug a tree' that the road-builders cut down to widen the road and put street lights on the narrowed divider opposite the al-Malek Feisal mosque.

Watching 'Face to Face With The Polar Bear' on Animal Planet last night made me want to call the station and ask: "What happened to the female adolescent bear that was reduced to skin and bones? Why didn't the producers return to rescue her?"

Then it dawned on me this morning that I have to stop expecting others to do their part and start doing something myself - switch off the air-conditioners, change the light bulbs and start walking for that scrawny polar bear and other species endangered by global warming.

A 30 minutes walk to and fro would in fact help me lose weight and keep fit, plus avoid getting into arguments about traffic rules and parking rights near my workplace and neighbourhood.

And on my way to work this morning, I noticed that there are at least two abandoned bungalows at Section 16, Petaling Jaya, that could have been put to good use.

I hope to continue walking for the polar bear for as long as I can.

Vanishing Ice (World Environment Day Special)Animal Planet Premiere Tuesday June 5 at 6.30pmCoinciding with World Environment Day on June 5, Animal Planet will feature two one-hour programs back-to-back every Tuesday throughout June, focusing on a variety of animals affected by the world’s melting ice. See how climate change and other environmental impacts are dramatically affecting polar bears, killer whales, wolves and penguins and what the changes mean for their imminent future. Vanishing Ice World Environment Day special programs include: June 05 (6.30pm) – Boy Among Polar Bears June 05 (7.30pm) – Face To Face With The Polar Bear